Saturday, October 16, 2010

Friday was a sick day for mom, but one in which I could muddle through, provided there wasn't a lot of resistance and whining. So I mixed it up a bit. Here's what the day looked like:

Devotional time, working in Quiet Time Journals and AWANA verse memorization

Handwriting in our Handwriting Without Tears book.

Science, in which we read about animals, and watched a couple of brief videos related to what we were reading about

Reading through a few more Bob books

Tried out a new website, NeoK12, for some logic games. Ian liked Connect 4 and Parking Zone in particular.

A little time outside before lunch

During lunch, we had a picnic in the living room while we watched "Sunken Treasure", an episode of Reading Rainbow that dealt with the discovery and recovery of treasure from the Spanish ship Atocha. Part of the episode also showed some real life footage about the Titanic, which was pretty cool too.

After lunch we went to the library and quite accidentally, Ian saw a book about the Titanic and immediately recognized it and decided he wanted to take it out. :)

Part of our History lessons has been learning about Archaeology, and how we learn about past civilizations, so the Reading Rainbow video really fit in quite nicely. :) After we got home Ian "read" through the Titanic graphic novel he had found, and then I showed him the National Geographic book I have on the Titanic, which he thoroughly devoured as well. All in all, not a bad day.

Later in the afternoon, we worked on making Crazy Hats for our AWANA Crazy Hat night. If you would have seen the hats, you would understand why this presented a physics and engineering lesson all by itself! LOL... But really, it was a fun time of creativity and brainstorming.

Wednesday, October 13, 2010

Okay, so school has been in full swing for a little over a month, and we are managing quite well. Things that were a struggle last year, like attitudes and Math, seem to be a breeze this year. What a difference a few months make!! I'm so happy. :) See?

Reading was a bit of slow going last year, but has picked up considerably this year. Again, so happy! Over the summer, I began to see some encouraging signs. For example, one day we went to the library, and for the first time, Ian made straight for the books, instead of the videos. It used to be that he would nag me about getting a video, and he'd let me worry about the books. No more. He had discovered some of my childhood comic books from Scotland just before this, and that seems to have been the catalyst for finding more comic books and graphic novels. I have mixed feelings about the Star Wars GNs, but if it keeps him interested in reading, I'm willing to reserve judgment.

In the meantime, we are continuing in our schoolwork with The Ordinary Parent's Guide to Teaching Reading as extras like Bob Books. The Bob Books are a bit below where he's at, but I thought they would be fun, and build his confidence. I was right on both counts. The first day I pulled out the Bob Books, my intention was just to read through the first book. (There are 12.) Ian pulled out one after another, till I finally stopped him at the end of book 4. It was a huge encouragement, just to see his enthusiasm. :)

Even with all this positive stuff happening I have to say that the reading process is frustrating to me. He is learning and picking up things at a decent rate, but sometimes he gets confused and flustered and starts making guesses at the words, and the guesses are SO off-base! So I'm trying to make it fun for both of us, and right now fun for Ian is drawing! So today, while working through our reading lesson, I wrote sentences and stories up on our white board, and had him draw simple pictures of the subject matter after each sentence. It really seemed to keep the mood light and fun, so I think we'll be doing that a lot more! :) In fact, halfway through our lesson today, he said, "Reading is fun!" YAAYYYY!